Using ICT for Co-creation of Inclusive Public Space
Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Joana Solipa Batista, Inês Almeida,
Marluci Menezes, Aelita Skaržauskienė, Monika Mačiulienė,
C3Places - Using ICT for Co-Creation of Inclusive Public Places
ISBN 978-989-757-154-1
DOI 10.24140/2021/EB-978-989-757-154-1
Authors
Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Joana Solipa Batista, Inês Almeida Universidade Lusófona, Portugal
Marluci Menezes
National Laboratory of Civil Engineering, Portugal
Aelita Skaržauskienė, Monika Mačiulienė Mykolas Romeris University, Lithuania
Dick Botteldooren, Timothy Van Renterghem Ghent University, Belgium
© 2021 C3Places Project
Edições Universitárias Lusófonas
JOINT PROGRAMMING INITIATIVE URBAN EUROPEAN
This e-book Introduction C3Places Policy Brief
Partners Keywords
Inclusive and digital communities Co-creation of public spaces Community involvement
Public space users and their socio-spatial practices Web-mobile technologies
Results of C3Places Living Labs
4 5 6 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 27 28 30 32 35 37 39 40 41 42 44 46 48 50 Ghent
Can attitude towards greenery improve road traffic noise perception? A case study of a highly-noise exposed cycling path
Influence of personal factors on sound perception and overall experience in urban green areas. A case study of a cycling path highly exposed to road traffic noise
Interactive soundscape augmentation of an urban park in a real and virtual setting Classifying urban public spaces according to their soundscape
Lisbon
C3Places Lisbon
The C3Places mobile application Loom of Ideas
Brief notes on social value of public spaces
Brief notes on user’s participation in public spaces planning and design Reflections on teenagers use of public open space
Potentials and bottlenecks in digital co-creation with teenagers
Exploring teenagers’ spatial practices and needs in light of new communication technologies Co-creation of teenager-sensitive public spaces
Milan
Participatory co-creation and urban sustainability: the role of cooperation in the ICT era ICT-Based participatory co-creation of urban sustainability
The University of Milan contribution to the C3Places Project Social Campus
An example of digitally shared infrastructure creating a participatory community in an urban open spaces
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CONTENTS
T A B L E O F
How can ICT provision improve aspects of spatial use and quality?
Co-creation of POS – challenges and opportunities Actors and their roles in the co-creation of POS
Possible benefits of using ICT tools in co-creation process Evaluation of Digital tools for co-creation of public open space Types of ICT tools
Digitally supported co-creation within public open space development process Methodological Framework for living labs for co-creation of public spaces Co-Creation of Public Open Places. Practice - Reflection – Learning
Framing the rationale of C3Places 57
58 61 64 66 68 71 76 77 78 79 79 Outcomes by the Project Partners
Further Reading
Article
This e-book and correspondent platform MyC3Place present the collection of the outcomes carried out by the partners of the C3Places Project.
It explores the new dynamics of open spaces as a trusted service for community and expands our understanding on how mediated public open spaces function, paying attention to stakeholders, local context and different social groups.
The e-book shows how it's possible to increase the quality of public open spaces (squares, parks, green spaces) as a community’s service, reflecting through ICT the needs of different social groups. Public spaces are critical for cultural identity, as they offer the place for interactions among generations and ethnicities. Even in the digital era, people still need contact with nature and other people to develop different life skills, values and attitudes, to be healthy, satisfied and environmentally responsible. Using ICT and co-creating with users, this e-book expands our knowledge on meeting emerging citizens’ needs about the future public space.
All the contents are classified by means of keywords that are described on the following pages. Then the work of each partner is presented in detail.
T H I S E - B O O K
Discover the site MyC3Place
In the last decades ICT have grown into an important social medium.
People build and maintain the relationships through various social media, and increasingly this affects the way they organise their everyday lives and how they use the city and its spaces.
Yet, diversity of public open spaces remains critical for cultural identity development, as they provide important gathering points in the urban fabric and offer the place for interactions among generations and ethnicities.
People of all ages still need contact with nature and with other people, to develop different life skills, values and attitudes, to be healthy, satisfied with their lives and environmentally responsible.
C3Places generates knowledge and know-how for a co-creation approach to be used to merge the use of ICT with these essential functions of the public spaces.
I N T R O D U C T I O N
C3Places (ERA-NET Cofund Smart Urban Futures Call - ENSUF) aim is to develop strategies and tools to increase the quality of public open spaces through Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) by influencing positively co-
creation and social cohesion effects.
The Project C3Places presents the first results and launches a policy brief on co- creation of public spaces. In this policy brief the Project, heeding the sustainability
calls for engaging concerned stakeholders in decision making, provides guidance on where to start, how to approach creatively placemaking and how to make use of digital tools. The overarching lesson learnt is that placemaking is an unfinished
business and therefore demands a vision to succeed.
C 3 P L A C E S P O L I C Y B R I E F
O N C O - C R E A T I O N O F I N C L U S I V E P U B L I C O P E N S P A C E S A N D T H E U S E
O F D I G I T A L T O O L S
The Project C3Places (www.c3places.eu) is concerned with places (parks, squares, streets, etc.) that affect us all on a multitude of levels: physically, socially, psychologically and culturally. The Project, aimed at developing strategies and tools to increase the quality of public open spaces through digital technologies, has learned much about how placemaking can positively influence co-creation and effect social cohesion.
The lessons learned in the Project show that when digital technology is not only used to transform the public realm into more high-tech places it can rather contribute to enrich the experiences of all users and support their involvement in placemaking. This in turn could fuel people’s greater attachment to places. Because it is always about people. The overarching lesson learnt is that using digital in co-creation processes is still very demanding, from various aspects. C3Places has not simply added empirical nuance to studies of contemporary urban places, but has offered important critiques of the way that cities are theorised and understood.
This policy brief gives concerned stakeholders arguments for decision taking on where to start, how to approach placemaking and set priorities for co-creation supported by digital tools.
UNDERSTANDING BENEFITS AND IMPORTANCE OF PUBLIC SPACE Which arguments can be used?
It is paramount for public spaces to be inclusive, responsive, and inviting for all. Public space is a common good and an important resource of urban justice, inclusiveness, social cohesion and quality of life. If planned, designed and implemented responsibly, such places can help transform the way people live, work, learn, spend leisure time, and interact socially.
Studies have shown that people’s physical and mental health and well-being is improved by contact with nature, green landscapes and by regular doses of outdoor activities. However, public spaces must be located where people live, work, learn and play and well accessible to all. For example, the empiric evidence provided by C3Places show that for teenagers’, the availability and proximity to different public services and facilities, is one of the reasons that makes their neighbourhood a good place to live. That seems to be truth to other age groups as well. For an inclusive urban public space, it is crucial to provide “liveable” public spaces, of different typologies, within an immediate neighbourhood or at a close walking distance. In addition, good environmental quality has to be ensured to make using a public space a pleasant experience. The more high-tech our lives become, the more nature we need. The COVID-19 pandemic is making clear that socialising online is not enough for health and well- being of people. They need to go out, be active and in contact with nature and each other on an everyday basis. A well distributed network of public spaces across the urban fabric, especially those rich with natural features are a key factor for quality of life and is in a current situation proven to be an important asset to mitigate the negative effects of lockdown and social distancing. It is necessary to take this into consideration for the future urban development on all levels.
FOR INCREASED SPATIAL QUALITY, INVEST IN RESEARCH What are spatial quality factors and how to achieve and keep them?
To make public open spaces effective it is important to take into consideration all necessary spatial quality aspects. Among the most important are provision of good accessibility to all, comfort and security, legibility, navigation and convenience for movement. These refer to the level of captivation, cleanness, safety, available attractivities for users, which includes equipment, greenery, level of vitality and variety of possible activities. Besides these aspects, there are also other intangible factors such as image of a place, personalisation and individual appropriation possibilities, adaptability, environmental quality and ecological sustainability.
C3Places project examined various stages and types of cocreation and proves that the best way to capture the community needs on public spaces towards specifying quality responses and standards is via implementation of co-creation processes. Quality is a fundamental criterion to achieve responsive and inclusive places. This calls for direct support and investments in scientific and practical research to provide evidence-based urban environment, local needs, and conditions. Research evidence must be the basis for urban planning and design and should be produced at different levels and together with different stakeholders – local authorities and experts, academia, civic society organizations, businesses, public institutions, and people that after all enlivens the places. Co-creation can be a strategy to open the opportunities for all those stakeholders to come together and share knowledge, experiences, practices, needs and ideas for high quality public spaces. It must also be assured that funding is appropriate, not only to plan and design public spaces, but for their maintenance and adaptions when necessary.
PLACES & LEARNING – LEARN ABOUT PUBLIC SPACES, LEARN IN PUBLIC SPACE Why urban learning should be motivated?
Investing in research advances the knowledge on quality aspects, inclusiveness and co- creation of public spaces on general and local level. The C3Places experiences proved that understanding local context, both from spatial and social aspects are crucial to effectively address real potentials and needs of local places and communities but also revealed two contrasting realities coexisting simultaneously – a valorisation of public spaces that goes side by side with a weak urban literacy and spatial representation. Our pledge is to invest and promote territorial capacity building, connecting education and learning to environment and urban fabric. Urban education can enhance our understanding of the world around us, provide us with more and better opportunities and improve our quality of life. We learn everywhere and at any time. Places of daily use, as public spaces are important for lifelong learning and promotion of civic participation. Territorial education and capacity calls to advance knowledge on how to increase the ability and skills to understand, reflect and reason the urban space and urban environment that help people to orient, feel comfortable, pay attention, care and appropriate the places in a civic and sustainable manner. The experiences of the living labs prove that integrating co-creation into the development process contributes significantly to the exchange and increase of knowledge of different stakeholders and empower them not only for further participation but also for better use of possibilities offered for better quality of life.
CO-CREATION AS A RESPONSE FOR INCLUSIVE PUBLIC OPEN SPACES Why co-creation approach is important? Which benefits can be expected?
C3Places uses the terms inclusive and responsible place to describe a far-reaching framework of principles on which communities can build a shared commitment to sustainability in social and urban development. The fundamental principle is to involve communities, from the very beginning in the making and transforming of public spaces, giving people a voice and a forum to set priorities, negotiate their needs and preferences and actively participate into development of suitable solutions. The co-creative approach is intrinsically user-oriented because it helps the people and organizations to promote their own decisions, develop capacities for open-ended social innovations, rather than invites citizens to participate in existing initiatives. Co-creation has enhanced debates concerning the nature of contemporary cities. Co-creation of public spaces offers an excellent opportunity to actively engage different stakeholders in the process of the production and consumption of urban fabric. Participatory strategies and methodologies, as co-creation, imply sharing clear goals and expectations, to assure a common understanding among all stakeholders involved. It may be time consuming on a first sight, seems short term more expensive, and require councils to devote time and resources for placemaking. but it brings long-term all-round benefits that cannot be achieved in any other way. It supports local community interactions that are crucial for quality of everyday life.
Through active co-creation of own environment, a positive attitude, care and the sense of place is developed among people, as well as the possibility of reducing common problems on spatial and social level, as for example safety, lack attractiveness and responsiveness, vandalism, social exclusion and urban alienation. C3Places' pledge is for involving the community in placemaking. The experiences show that people do not ask for flamboyant public spaces, rather they need places where they feel welcome, safe, and inspired to use.
Public spaces should demonstrate conviviality, allowing a variety of activities and practices - with diversity of areas, greenery, and equipment (for both individual and group use). Flexibility is a crucial feature to ensure more responsible and user-friendly places. Finding a balance between responding to "everyday life" needs and fostering new (even transitory or ephemeral) ones is a challenge. Taking it, calls for setting public space at the core of the community, it has to be rooted in local needs and negotiated within the community.
INTERLINK CO-CREATION PROCESS AND PUBLIC SPACE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS Where to start?
Co-creation is an approach but also a tool to be used within spatial planning, design, implementation and management process (open space development). C3Places proved that multi staged co-creation process by well-considered interlinking of different types of engagement activities with adequate expertise support in all phases of spatial development is crucial. In this way, positive outcomes of co-creation in public spaces exceed features of the final product, a spatial solution. There are many different types of collaboration activities, varying in intensities of citizen engagement depending on the issue addressed from sharing and interpreting information, co-learning, expressing opinions, defining priorities, refining ideas, making decisions, creating common values, implementing solutions, monitoring, etc.
USING DIGITAL TOOLS FOR CO-CREATION
What are the potentials of digital tools to enhance public spaces, the bottlenecks and how to deal with them?
ICT offer interactive and innovative tools which can better connect people and places. Mobile technology and digital media are creating new social spaces, transforming the physical public space in a hybrid space. In this context, digital technology becomes an important resource to enrich the use of public spaces, turn placemaking more dynamic and to foster the democratic process of placemaking and co-creation. On the other side, the use of digital tools can be quite demanding in relation to the necessary knowledge and skills and well as technical equipment. C3Places' pledge when technological decisions are implemented, they have to be bolstered by scientific reasoning. In an immature environments these technological solutions can accelerate negative aspects of exclusion and distance even more from the desirable goal of an inclusive community.
Although we can reasonably expect that in the near future both the availability and usability of digital tools and the knowledge to use them effectively will greatly improve, it is important to understand and take into account that not every situation is equally suitable for this approach. To support decisions on the appropriateness of the particular situation C3Places has developed a tool, a Digital Co-Creation Index, which provides guidance to assess conditions as well as to evaluate, measure and compare different digital co-creation initiatives. The index is compiled in three sub-indexes: Public space quality Index, to evaluate physical and social aspects of the place; Digital Inclusiveness Index, which explains the extent to which affordable technology enables co-creation; and Social Responsiveness Index, which is linked to stakeholders and community members and addresses their maturity to respond to social challenges and generate public value.
C3Places Project | www.c3places.eu
DECIDING FOR DIGITAL CO-CREATION OF PUBLIC SPACES
Is your situation/context suitable for co-creation of inclusive public spaces by digital tools?
P A R T N E R S
Universidade Lusófona, Interdisciplinary Research Centre for Education and
Development Lisbon, Portugal
LNEC - National Laboratory of Civil Engineering
Lisbon, Portugal
Mykolas Romeris University - Lab of Social Technologies
Vilnius, Lithuania
Ghent University – Department of Information Technology
Ghent, Belgium
University of Milan - Department of Computer Science
Milan, Italy
UIRS - Urban Planning Institute of the Republic of Slovenia
Ljubljana, Slovenia
K E Y W O R D S
Inclusive & Digital Communities
C3Places has as primary objective to develop knowledge and know- how to design attractive, responsive and inclusive public spaces by integrating efficiently social value and ICT solutions. The Project is driven by five keywords which gives it credibility and expertise to explore the new dynamics of public spaces as a service for community, with the involvement of stakeholders.
Co-creation of public open spaces
Community Involvement
Public space users and their social practises
Inclusion means to appreciate and value human differences and variety of lifestyles in a rich and diversified environment that promotes a sense of belonging and where everyone feels respected and valued. In an inclusive community every member should feel safe, respected, and comfortable in being her/himself and express their identity. Inclusive communities create a welcoming environment, so that everyone's skills, creativity and innovation potential are recognized, cultivated and routinely utilized.
An inclusive community brings different cultural perspectives together in many contexts. For C3Places public spaces are the place where each person shares a sense of belonging with other members of the community. Therefore, appropriate spaces should be provided in order to generate mutual enjoyment and enhance citizens ’cooperation and also to redress policies and practices that perpetuate the harmful effects of discrimination and segregation.
In the digital era technologies are ever-present, so that we dare to speak about digital communities, inspired in Kenna & Maksymiuk (2019) who discuss some contrasting analyzes of the socio-spatial practices and impacts that are resulting from the uptake of new technologies in urban public spaces. Even a declining significance of public spaces in the digital era was predicted, a fact that the different examples addressed in Smaniotto et al.
(2019) have been proven wrong. ICT have potential to generate and increase social inequalities, as well as to offer new opportunities for encountering 'others' in the city. The design and structure of technological solutions can give impetus to the purposeful development towards community common good.
However, social values of the citizens acting in a collective environment have to be aligned or coordinated. As Skarzauskiene et al. (2015) warns, if technological decisions are implemented without scientific reasoning in an immature environment, these technological solutions can accelerate negative aspects of ICT and distance even more from the desirable goal of an inclusive community.
I N C L U S I V E &
D I G I T A L
C O M M U N I T I E S
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Co-creation - as an active process of engaging different stakeholders, is opening up new opportunities to bring in particular citizens into the design, implementation, monitoring and maintenance of public spaces - to a process that is also understood as the production of public spaces.
Co-creation seeks therefore to make the production of public space, on the one side more effective and efficient, and on the other more inclusive and responsive. By creating opportunities for dialogue and participation and making the production process more trusted it enables the government to deliver better places for the people.
It is more important than ever that citizen engagement and public participation are enacted properly to provide the necessary push and oversight for tailored policies. Co-creation initiatives and social cohesion should be based on the broad and active citizen engagement and community participation.
It is also a multi-stakeholder process that provides guidance and tools for all stakeholders, for government decision-makers and officials, for civil society organizations and activists to translate the outcomes into community-tailored solutions. A vibrant society must rely on initiatives and cooperation of the citizens to be able to attain a better quality of life.
C O - C R E A T I O N O F P U B L I C O P E N
S P A C E S
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For inclusive communities the involvement of all relevant stakeholders is essential. Involving the community means building relationships.
The community is at the core of placemaking, the process of involving people to “collectively reimagine and reinvent public spaces” (PPS) and its engagement should result in integrated knowledge and be translated in actions towards more inclusive and responsive public spaces.
For practice this also means advancing the co-creation of knowledge, collaborative agenda- setting and joint decision on commitments. Community involvement combines therefore elements of interactive engagement and intervention, provided that an active promotion of opportunities for participation is in place. There are different ways of involving the community and for refining commitment, these goes from in-kind and financial support, volunteering, engaging in different tasks, contributing with opinion and local knowledge. Enduring after all partnerships and through establishing and strengthening collaboration community involvement creates capacity to address changes in public policies.
C O M M U N I T Y
I N V O L V E M E N T
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It is also the aim of C3Places to bring together knowledge about the way the community uses and appropriates the public space, in light of the new technologies towards creating new understandings of the relationships between spaces and social behaviour.
Users of public space may differ in a multitude of factors, such as predominant age, gender, religion, nationality and language, physical and mental abilities, standard of living, level of education, 'majority' or to a marginalised segment of the population.
This diversity must be considered when improving the quality of public open spaces and defining participatory dynamics. C3Places is concerned with theoretical and methodological approaches, as well as novel research findings to deliver answers to relevant questions such:
What do people want from public space? Does this differ by socioeconomic status, gender, age? Menezes & Smaniotto (2017) addresses the questions research should pose in order to get a comprehensive picture of who uses public space, what for, when and with which artefacts.
These aspects are also relevant to better understand the way people use a public space and the resulting spatial practices. These combine therefore elements of sociology (people) and (urban) planning sciences (spaces) to examine the social and material constitution of spaces and the interactions between people and people, and people with their environment.
C3Places is interested in the material and conceptual opportunities that socio-spatial practice affords, in order to be able to obtain more knowledge to guide the design of policies. The Project is therefore not interested in individual data but grouped phenomena on the basis of similarities.
The socio-spatial practices that build the C3Places knowledge base in Ghent, Lisbon, Milan and Vilnius are addressed at description of cases.
P U B L I C S P A C E
U S E R S A N D T H E I R S O C I O - S P A T I A L
P R A C T I C E S
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Undoubtedly, digital and mobile technologies are penetrating in all spheres of our lives. The increasing ubiquity and pervasiveness are also transforming our physical living space into a meditated and hybrid place.
The Project C3Places developed a framework for better understanding how digital tools can support the co-creation processes.
The types of ICT tools and their supporting devices were systemised in main category groups describing where the tool is installed in relation to the public space and how an ICT tool interacts with the user.
W E B - M O B I L E
T E C H N O L O G I E S
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Ghent
Belgium
R E S U L T S O F C 3 P L A C E S
L I V I N G L A B S
Lisbon
Portugal
Milan
Italy
Vilnius
Lithuania
The Ghent Public Open Space living lab will be centred on urban green users as there is a particular interest for people using such spaces, which often struggle to survive in the urban realm because they are exposed to a broad range of environmental polluters (e.g., particulate, noise, etc.).
The Ghent living lab is different from the other case studies of the C3Places network, because it does not necessarily look at a single “physical” place, but rather at a system of places and their virtual (and social) counterparts. One of such (meta)spaces is located in Ghent in a public park and square that connect to the newly build library of the future “De Krook” that also houses experience labs of Ghent University and IMEC. It is supported by the broader Ghent Living Lab initiative.
G H E N T L I V I N G L A B
Ghent University IMEC
Ghent Living Lab Initiative
City of Ghent City of Antwerp Ringland Local Partners
Living Lab
Read the full article
This study was based on an on-site survey along a highly noise exposed cycling path immersed in the green, in close proximity of Antwerp Ring Road in Belgium.
The survey was held at 181 passers-by during a working week in September 2017. The survey included questions about overall cycling/walking experience, perceived loudness of road traffic noise, soundscape appreciation, perceived dominance of sound sources, and overall attitude towards greenery’s potential to reduce noise and improve air quality.
A k-means cluster analysis was performed on the scores of the attitude towards greenery (ATG) questions to create an ATG variable reflecting two profiles of users:
“positive” and “sceptical” towards greenery’s potential.
The effect of ATG on overall cycling/walking experience, perceived loudness of road traffic noise, soundscape appreciation and perceived dominance of sound sources was tested through a set of independent samples t-tests. Results show statistically significant differences between the positive and the sceptical group for the dimensions of annoyance and calmness, perceived loudness of road traffic noise and perceived dominance of road traffic sounds and natural sounds.
However, no difference was observed for the two groups in terms of overall cycling/walking experience, suggesting that, for the investigated case, other factors might be playing a role.
Francesco Aletta, Timothy Van Renterghem, Dick Botteldooren
C A N A T T I T U D E T O W A R D S G R E E N E R Y I M P R O V E R O A D T R A F F I C N O I S E
P E R C E P T I O N ?
A c a s e s t u d y o f a h i g h l y - n o i s e e x p o s e d c y c l i n g p a t h
Aletta, F., Van Renterghem, T., & Botteldooren, D. (2018). Can attitude towards greenery improve road traffic noise perception? A case study of a highly-noise exposed cycling path. In Proceedings of the 11th European Congress and Exposition on Noise Control Engineering (pp. 2377–2382). Hersonissos, Crete, Greece.
Article
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Francesco Aletta, Timothy Van Renterghem, Dick Botteldooren
In contemporary urban design, green public areas play a vital role. They have great societal value, but if exposed to undue environmental noise their restorative potential might be compromised. On the other hand, research has shown that the presence of greenery can moderate noise annoyance in areas with high sound levels, while personal factors are expected to play an important role too.
A cycling path bordered by vegetation, but highly exposed to road traffic noise, was here considered as a case study. A sound perception survey was submitted to participants on site and they were subsequently sorted into groups according to their noise sensitivity, visual attention and attitude towards greenery.
The aim of this study was testing whether these three personal factors could affect their noise perception and overall experience of the place. Results showed that people highly sensitive to noise and more sceptical towards greenery’s potential as an environmental moderator reported worse soundscape quality, while visually attentive people reported better quality. These three personal factors were found to be statistically independent. This study shows that several person-related factors impact the assessment of the sound environment in green areas. Although the majority of the respondents benefit from the presence of visual green, policy-makers and planners should be aware that for a significant subset of the population, it should be accompanied by a tranquil soundscape to be fully appreciated.
I N F L U E N C E O F P E R S O N A L F A C T O R S
O N S O U N D P E R C E P T I O N A N D O V E R A L L E X P E R I E N C E I N U R B A N G R E E N A R E A S
A C a s e S t u d y o f a C y c l i n g P a t h H i g h l y E x p o s e d t o R o a d T r a f f i c N o i s e
Aletta, F., Van Renterghem, T., & Botteldooren, D. (2018). Influence of Personal Factors on Sound Perception and Overall Experience in Urban Green Areas. A Case Study of a Cycling Path Highly Exposed to Road Traffic Noise. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(6), 1118. doi:10.3390/ijerph15061118
Article
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Timothy Van Renterghem, Kang Sun, Karlo Filipan, Kris Vanhecke, Toon De Pessemier, Bert De Consel, Wout Joseph, Dick Botteldooren
Inappropriate soundscapes are able to strongly deteriorate the user experience in parks. A possible remediation is adding positively perceived sounds.
The case of an urban park, fully surrounded by road traffic noise sources, was studied to explore the potential of adding natural sounds in an interactive way. A preliminary test was conducted in the lab with Virtual Reality (VR) glasses and headphones.
The audio-visual representation of the real environment was obtained by combining binaural recordings with first-order ambisonics and 360-degree video camera footage.
The users were allowed to mix in eight types of natural sounds until their personal optimized soundscape was composed. This was done in a very similar setup as in the (real) park. The loudspeaker augmenting the sound environment in the park was steered with a smartphone application.
This app ensured the user’s presence near the loudspeaker and allowed to gather more detailed assessments of the perceived sound environment through questionnaires. This combination of experiments allowed checking the validity of VR that is becoming increasingly popular in audio-visual interaction studies. In addition, the most preferred natural sounds and the way they influenced environmental noise perception were analyzed.
I N T E R A C T I V E S O U N D S C A P E
A U G M E N T A T I O N O F A N U R B A N P A R K I N A R E A L A N D V I R T U A L S E T T I N G
Van Renterghem, T., Sun, K., Filipan, K., Vanhecke, K., De Pessemier, T., De Coensel, B., … Botteldooren, D. (2019).
Interactive soundscape augmentation of an urban park in a real and virtual setting. In M. Ochmann, M. Vorländer, & J.
Fels (Eds.), Proceedings of the 23rd International Congress on Acoustics : integrating 4th EAA Euroregio 2019 : 9-13 September 2019 in Aachen, Germany (pp. 899–903). Aachen, Germany: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Akustik.
Article
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Cities are composed of many types of outdoor spaces, each with their distinct soundscape. Some of these soundscapes can be extraordinary, others are often less memorable. However, most locations in a city are not visited with the purpose of experiencing the soundscape. Consequently, the soundscape will not necessarily attract attention. Existing methods based on the circumplex model of affect classify soundscapes according to the pleasure and arousal they evoke, but do not fully take into account the goals and expectations of the listener. Therefore, in earlier work, a top-level hierarchical classification method was developed, which distinguishes between spaces based on the degree to which the soundscape creates awareness of the acoustical environment, matches expectations and arouses the listener.
This paper presents the results of an immersive laboratory experiment, designed to validate this classification method. The experiment involved 40 participants and 50 audiovisual recordings drawn from the Urban Soundscapes of the World database.
It is shown that the proposed classification method results in clearly distinct classes, and that membership to these classes can be explained well by physical parameters, extracted from the acoustical environment as well as the visual scene.
Kang Sun, Karlo Filipan, Francesco Aletta, Timothy Van Renterghem, Toon De Pessemier, Wout Joseph, Dick Botteldooren, Bert De Consel
C L A S S I F Y I N G U R B A N P U B L I C S P A C E S A C C O R D I N G T O T H E I R S O U N D S C A P E
Article
Sun, K., Filipan, K., Aletta, F., Van Renterghem, T., De Pessemier, T., Joseph, W., … De Coensel, B. (2019).
Classifying urban public spaces according to their soundscape. In M. Ochmann, M. Vorländer, & J. Fels (Eds.), Proceedings of the 23rd International Congress on Acoustics : integrating 4th EAA Euroregio 2019 : 9-13 September 2019 in Aachen, Germany (pp. 6100–6105). Aachen, Germany: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Akustik.
The Lisbon Living Lab will be centred on teenagers (young people 13 to 17 years of age) as they are a particular age group with specific needs and interests on public spaces, the relationship between teens and public spaces is very intrinsic, as public spaces may serve as a fundamental (play)ground for teenagers’ development.
The Lisbon’s Alvalade neighbourhood will be living lab to explore how teenagers use and behaviour in urban fabric and what are they needs and preferences on public open spaces. The main objective is to engage teenagers in a process of the co-creation of urban spaces, by exploring the leading research question: “How can we capitalise on teenagers’ new-found love of the wired life (Thomas, 2013) to encourage them to be more outdoors?”
Universidade Lusófona Interdisciplinary Research Centre for Education and Development National Laboratory of Civil Engineering Secondary School Padre António Vieira Parish Council of Alvalade
Local Partners
Living Lab
L I S B O N L I V I N G L A B
C3Places in Lisbon implemented living labs on urban planning and design targeting teenagers in Alvalade neighbourhood.
The labs were developed for co-creative and collaborative practice, exploring opportunities for a direct involvement of teenagers in placemaking, providing a platform for learning and free expression of values and ideas about and for urban fabric.
The methodology encompassed different tools, such as thematic workshops, exploratory site visits in the neighbourhood, discussions and debates sessions and questionnaires, focused on teenagers’ practices, uses and needs on public open spaces.
The living labs were implemented in two phases.
A pilot phase was organised between February and May 2018 with two 10th grade classes (N=49 students, aged 15 to 18), consisting in total of 24 hours intervention per class, with both indoor and outdoor activities, aimed at discussing the city and its production.
A methodological decision was made by the researchers on which data should be analysed in more depth. Materials as questionnaires and the facilitators observational notes, as direct tools for data collection, were prioritized. Questionnaires had closed questions, analysed quantitively, and open questions, analysed through thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006).
Other data resulting from materials that provided support for the activities and exercises complemented and reinforced these analyses.
C 3 P L A C E S L I S B O N
Joana Batista, Inês Almeida, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
The second phase, a week-long lab was organised in May 2019 with two classes of the first year of professional training education (N=20, aged 16 to 18). The students developed and justified design proposals for the space in front of their school.
The labs were organised in four sessions of 1,5 hour each with an emphasis on group work and on the use of digital tools (Padlet, image bank, presentation programmes and Google Maps). The facilitators observational notes, a questionnaire to assess importance of co-creation and the teenagers’ proposals presented by teenagers analysed.
Living labs were complemented with other methods of data collection, as space observations and interviews with experts. Space observations enabled to obtain an overview of the whole neighbourhood, as well as a more focused outline on public spaces used by teenagers.
Two sets observations were conducted, undertaken at different periods of the day and different days of the week. Descriptive notes and an image library enriched the field work. The first set of observations consisted of mapping out the local public spaces. In the second set, the Marquês de Soveral Street, where the school is located, and well known and used space by the teenage students, was selected for detailed observations (during a twenty-day period).
Data were collected with the aid of two distinctive observation grids. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with the four planning experts working with public space issues at the Junta de Freguesia de Alvalade (parish council).
The quality of the analysis is secured through several steps, such as: familiarization with the data; generating initial codes which were then aggregated into potential themes; initial themes review, and identifying final themes (Braun & Clarke, 2006).
Developing and testing of a mobile application to support research activities is one of the goals of the C3Places Project. The C3Places application is designed to enable researchers to address questions related to the use of public spaces via digital technology. A relevant aspect of the digital and mobile technologies lies in their possibility to enhance communication with prospective users, hence enabling possibilities for creative participation in placemaking and co-creation.
The C3Places application consists of two main components: a web service (web platform) and the smartphone application (app) and is enabled to be used anywhere in the world. It allows researchers to collect evidence base and demonstrate the social values of public spaces - backed by users’ opinion and views. Also, by providing evidence and demonstrating that public space is having a positive societal impact can increase the enthusiasm for more inclusive and responsive public spaces.
By collecting such data, the C3Places App contributes to better explore and more precisely research on public space practices, as well integrate the use and point of view of several users on different spaces. Another interesting feature lies in the possibility to collect the weather conditions automatically, therefore researchers can also reflect on how weather conditions affect (or not) the usage of public open spaces.
Finally, considering that it is up to the researcher to create the questions or the photo questionnaire, the possibilities are infinite and can be addressed directly to each research topic that is being carried out. So, the C3Places app allows scholars and researchers to make more specific or broader public open space research and, since it runs in Android operative system, the range is quite extensive. The use of the C3Places App is free and can be requested at c3places.coordination@ulusofona.pt.
The manual for preparing a research subject with the help of the C3Places App can be downloaded here.
Inês Almeida, Joana Batista, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
T H E C 3 P L A C E S M O B I L E A P P L I C A T I O N
The Loom was developed to encourage a broad participation of students identifying spatial qualities and problems and stands in the school hall from May to July 2019. It had seven multiple choice questions displayed in columns (place of living, mode of transportation from home to school, frequency of public open space use for leisure, the activities performed, use of commercial places in free time and reason for it and use of smartphone).
A nail indicated the place for each possible answer. For each school grade different coloured woollen yarns hanged next to the questions (the school has grade 7 to 12).
To provide their answer the students should wrap the yarn around the corresponding nail (altogether 56 answers were collected) (Figure 2.2).
Joana Batista, Inês Almeida, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
As a way to engage a higher number of students in a reflection on the use and quality of the space in front of the school, a visually attractive and interactive board - called Loom and Clothesline of Ideas (Figure 2.1).
L O O M O F I D E A S
Figure 2.1: Loom of Ideas with collected answers. Photo C3Places Project (2019).
In the clothesline students could write down in cards comments, suggestions or ideas and hung them in the line (Figure 2.3).
Altogether 35 cards were collected.
Two main issues raised from the cards: the request for more sitting facilities in the school yard and around the school, and the call for more outdoor activities.
Yet, placemaking can only make a direct contribution for the first issue, but on the flip side, when the outdoor conditions are more suitable, the second call – more outdoor activities – can be easier accomplished.
Figure 2.2: A student is contributing with some answers to the Loom. Photo C3Places Project (2019).
Figure 2.3: Some ideas teenagers’ left in the Clothesline. Photo C3Places Project (2019).
Joana Batista, Inês Almeida, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
Public space is here conceptualised following UN-Habitat (2015: 15) as “all places publicly owned or of public use, accessible and enjoyable by all for free and without profit motive”. Among them are streets, squares, plazas, marketplaces, parks, green spaces, greenways, community gardens, playgrounds, waterfronts, urban forests and agricultural used land. C3Places research focus only on urban public open spaces.
Public spaces have been idealised as democratic domains, places of inclusiveness where is possible to be among friends and strangers, encounter differences and engage in planned or serendipitous interactions (Innerarity, 2006). Central to a city well-being, public spaces contribute to the quality of urban life, fostering social, cultural and economic capital (UN-Habitat, 2016). A vast body of literature focus on their social function (Figure 2.4), as providers of the place for peoples’ interaction with other people (Carmona, Heath, Tiesdell, & Oc, 2003; Gehl, 1987; Innerarity, 2006;
Jacobs, 1961; Lefebvre, 1991; Sennett, 1977) and with their environment (Smaniotto &
Menezes, 2016). Public spaces act as stage for the enactment of citizenship, to practice publicness, and as such they play a key role within the complex social infrastructure (Smaniotto Costa & Menezes, 2016). Societies’ differences and similarities are put on display in public spaces, allowing distinct groups to claim their right to appropriate particular places and manifest their sense of belonging to society (Innerarity, 2006; Mitchell, 1995). Public spaces enable symbolic identification (Carmona et al., 2003), they are the places where social and cultural identities and the individuals’ role in their community are negotiated, and this may foster the context for mutual understanding and respect, enabling the development of social bonds. Yet, historically, public space was also the site where power structures manifested themselves and dominant social and moral orders were produced, imposed and perpetuated (Sennett, 1977).
B R I E F N O T E S O N S O C I A L V A L U E O F
P U B L I C S P A C E S
Moreover, those public spaces covered by plants and with soft surfaces (Figure 2.5) offer further environmental benefits as they improve the urban environmental quality (such as air purification, water storage, CO2 sequestration) and provide space for leisure and recreational activities (Smaniotto Costa, Suklje Erjavec, & Mathey, 2008).
They offer also further benefits for public mental health (Muñoz, 2009) and for decreasing in contemporary health problems as obesity and sedentarism (Godbey, 2009). Jacobs (1961) and Gehl (1987) drew attention to the importance of putting people at the centre of public space, analysing how people appropriate specific places, what are their spatial practises and needs towards creating better and more inviting public spaces.
C3Places following those premisses is analysing how specific users – teenagers or elderly – appropriate urban public open spaces and how they can be better configurated to respond to different needs. In Lisbon, observations seem to indicate that urban public spaces of transit, as streets (Figure 2.6), are used mainly for matters of convenience and proximity to primary spaces of daily significance as the home and the school.
Figure 2.4: Public spaces as places of social interaction. Photo C3Places Project (2018).
Figure 2.5: Green spaces are beneficial for urban environmental quality and for urban quality of life. Photo C3Places Lisbon (2018).
Figure 2.6: Streets as central public spaces in people’s daily life, both as spaces of transit and circulation and of
Joana Batista, Inês Almeida, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
For C3Places a public space must be inclusive and responsive, allowing people to use it without restrictions and to fulfil socio-spatial needs. To achieve more inclusive and responsive spaces, users should have a voice in the process of planning and design, also known as placemaking (PPS, n. d.).
Engaging people actively calls for appropriate methodologies as inclusive design (Carmona, Heath, Tiesdell, & Oc, 2003) or co-creation, the last is at the core of C3Places research.
C3Places uses the terms inclusive and responsible place to describe a far-reaching framework of principles and best-practice on which communities can build a shared commitment to sustainability in social and urban development. For that, communities should be engaged in the making and transforming of public spaces from the very beginning.
Public space as a shared common good is the fundamental premise – public space is a resource which, if used responsibly, can help transform the way people live, work, recreate, and interact. In placemaking, stakeholders should have a clear understanding on how specific characteristics and shapes affect the experience of the space (Alves, 2005; Stevens, 2007). Therefore, interested parties as different users’
groups, community facilitators, professionals, local authorities and municipalities, should be engaged directly, their opinions accounted for and their needs responded to by placemaking (Alves, 2005; Carmona et al., 2003; Thompson, 2002; UN-Habitat, 2015).
B R I E F N O T E S O N U S E R ’ S
P A R T I C I P A T I O N I N P U B L I C S P A C E S
P L A N N I N G A N D D E S I G N
The case-study in Lisbon followed this recommendation and different stakeholders were brought together in the development and operationalisation of living labs (Figures 2.7 and 2.8) (Smaniotto-Costa, Almeida, Batista &
Menezes, 2018).
Participative approaches bring challenges of different sorts: in terms of time to be invested, human resources, monitoring and structuring the process that may impose demands that are too high for planners and authorities to see
Figure 2.7: Living Lab Lisbon – brainstorming exercise with participants to reflect on characteristics of and ideal public space.
Photo C3Places Lisbon (2018).
Figure 2.8: Living Lab Lisbon – group work to draw ideas and proposals for transformation of a public open space.
However, creating collaborative environments for planning, designing and transforming public spaces is fundamental for a placemaking process more interactive and able to meet the needs of the community, and to produce public places that are more attractive, meaningful, inclusive and sustainable.
Co-creation, as an open process with no previous fixed results, is a challenge for all parts involved but it is at the same time an open door for innovative ideas and solutions. In co-creation a broader range of people come together around the same table to negotiate and reconcile their different needs and interests, solve problems, freely express their concerns and expectations and, ideally, foster a community around public spaces ensuring more sustainable use (Figure 2.9).
The experiences gained within C3Places in the living labs in Ghent, Lisbon, Milan and Vilnius are described at the site MyC3Place.
Figure 2.9: Living lab Lisbon – outdoor exercise for participants to observe and discover different public open spaces. Photo C3Places Lisbon (2018).
the advantages; in deciding who to involve; the time offset between participation in the process and benefitting from the outcome may be too long for users to engage and, due to transitory needs of users’, too stretched to provide a response while the changes are still valid; questions may be considered too technical or complex for the comprehension of non-professionals and;
participation may add a legitimacy to the process but without truly respecting the opinions and ideas of those involved (Alves, 2005;
Jupp, 2007; Talen, 2000; Valentine, 2004).
Joana Batista, Inês Almeida, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
R E F L E C T I O N S O N T E E N A G E R S U S E O F P U B L I C O P E N S P A C E
C3Places Lisbon reflected on teenagers use and needs on public open space. Space observations evidenced the strong role of public spaces in Alvalade but, in broad terms, revealed that teenager’s usage turned out much lower than supposed. This was confirmed also by the difficulty identifying public spaces in the neighbourhood in the living labs. In the school surroundings, teenagers’ use of public space is directly related with school activities and schedules. Students using the space, mostly are in groups, talking, hanging out or smoking. Due to a lack of sitting equipment in the area, the students use the bus stop shelter
(where there is the only bench available), or sit in different places with other functions (at a bikes station, café tables, on the floor, on walls and access ramps, or on the steps of the building entrances), what can cause conflict among teenagers and with other users. However, it seems clear that the majority of students also only cross this space (Figure 2.10). Experts from the parish council see teenagers as a difficult group to work for/with since they mostly assume that teenagers’ behaviour in public spaces is inadequate and damaging to the
space and its equipment. Figure 2.10: The broad streets crossing in front of the school.
Photo C3Places Project (2019).
Neverthless, they are aware that adolescence is a period of transition and acknowledge that there is a lack of public spaces that meet teenagers’ needs.
Experts expect that the creation of flexible and multipurpose places, suiting different users, can diminish potential conflicts. Regarding the involvement of teenagers, a collaboration with schools isperceived as beneficial to engage teenagers in public discussions, from where they are currently absent from.
The teenagers engaged in co-creation, had a weak urban literacy, what made it difficult at times to reflect on their use of public space. Their favourite places also seem to be private and indoor spaces, such as shopping malls, where they hang out and meet peers.
However, the labs boost discussion on public space and main conclusion seems to point to a lack of public spaces meeting teenagers’ needs, in Alvaalde neighbourhood. Teenagers’ want quality public spaces, diverse and well equipped, easily accessible (by private and public transportation) and where they can meet and hang out with friends, sit in groups and feel welcome.
In the second phase of living labs two groups propose ideas for transformation of a public space in front of the school, used by students. The first group proposes a public meeting place for social gathering, with benches and tables with trees casting shadows, and changes in the street structure to increase pedestrian safety (more crossing, street narrowing). The second group proposed a new street design with less parking slots to create shared spaces and therefore increase road safety. The group suggested a green space with kiosk, trees, circular wooden benches and enhanced with a wi-fi hotspot and water dispenser.
Joana Batista, Inês Almeida, Carlos Smaniotto Costa, Marluci Menezes
P O T E N T I A L S A N D B O T T L E N E C K S I N D I G I T A L C O - C R E A T I O N W I T H
T E E N A G E R S
C3Places Lisbon Living Lab allowed to reflect on the potential and bottlenecks in digital co-creation with teenagers. The labs revealed the importance, of clear messages, goals and expectations, shared from the beginning.
Such messages have to encompass what is going to happen, why is it happening, when each task has to be performed, which results are expected and what are the benefits for participants.
In Lisbon, the labs revealed teenagers’ have a weak urban literacy and low spatial representation skills, and difficulties in identifying own needs and expressing ideas for public spaces, but the theme sparks interest in most of them and the interactive activities provide a forum for learning about urban space and share experience of teenagers use of space and needs.
For this reason is important to assess the knowledge, abilities and motivations of the target participants, and harness their full potential to actively participate in co- creation of public open spaces. To assess the success rate and overall satisfaction with the labs, a short questionnaire was distributed at the end of the last session asking students to indicate the perceived learning effect. The results flutuate between a high satisfaction and a disatisfaction, in line with the general observation made during all sessions; while a group of students showed interest and conducted lively the discussion, another small group remained apart, even not reacting to a direct request to express their ideas or opinions. While in the questions related to personal experience with collaboration and exchange of ideas, the agreement with statements was low, the ones related to learning effect by taking part of the workshops the agreement was higher.
